Eugene McCarthy, former senator and heroic, charismatic presidential candidate, occupies a unique place in American public life. Here, McCarthy continues to redefine the landscape by taking on the characters and issues of recent decades. McCarthy's observations are often amusing, but as often profound. They involve, among others, presidents, the press, special prosecutors, and persecutors.

It is an axiom of the author's that those who mean well often end up doing the most harm. He explains the downside of Billy Graham (he "made religion safe for TV and for presidents") and Walter Cronkite ("whose impression of seriousness created the illusion that television equals reality"), and he reexamines the consequences of Carter, Bush - in "Representation Without Taxation" - Reagan, Nixon, and Clinton & Co. - in "The No-Fault Presidency: Who, Me?".

McCarthy is against routine reforms, and most reformers, but his own prescriptions - Fidel Castro for baseball commissioner, celibacy for presidents, a football coach for defense secretary ("maybe two - one for offense, one for defense") - will leave readers in stitches and some pols needing a few.